Americans in their twenties and thirties often fail to vote in federal elections, but that cannot be said of older people. When retired workers are angry, politicians listen, because they know that if they don't, they are risking their seats in Congress.

　　Medicare, the federal program that pays a large part of the medical bills of elderly Americans, provides nothing for the cost of drugs. In recent years, as the price of drugs has soared in the US, there has been growing pressure on Congress to do something about the problem. Unfortunately Medicare is already an expensive program, and the costs will only go up as the number of long-lived elderly increases in the coming decades. Where is the money for a new drug benefit to come from in a time of gloomy economic news, unfavorable demographic trends and the Republican zeal to cut taxes?

　　Tom Toles' cartoon is a humorous examination of this issue. The nurse knows that the elderly patient needs medication that he cannot afford at present. He may be tempted to assume①that the new drug bills before the House and Senate, which are quite different and will have to be reconciled through negotiation, will solve the problem. The nurse sets him straight,pointing out that neither bill provides comprehensive coverage of drug costs. Moreover, even if Congress finally hammers out a compromise, the federal government is running a massive deficit,so how is the bill, generous or inadequate, to be funded? Toles, the regular editorial cartoonist for the centrist WashingtonPost , invites Ameri-cans to sympathize with the elderly (and soon-to-be elderly) who have to fret over these matters.

　　1、“你的血压又高了。”

　　2、“我们不知道为什么最近你这种

　　情况我们见得比以前多多了。”

　　3、“我们应该给你服药。”

　　4、“但是药很贵，你的医疗

　　保险又不包括这些药品。”

　　5、“国会还在为药物法案争论。”

　　6、“而且即使他们通过了一

　　个法案，你也不会喜欢它。”

　　7、“因为法案不会包括全部费用。”

　　8、“而且问题在于有了法案可

　　政府没钱支付。”

　　9、“噢！你的头已经爆炸了，最近这也见多了。”药品法案也不包括这一项。